How Many Undocumented Immigrants Live in Utah? A Direct Measure

Utah became a “New Destination” for foreign immigrants in the 1990s, and in-migration continued in the following decade. It is extremely difficult to obtain information on the undocumented component of the in-migration, despite their importance. For example, their presence will have a differential effect across the different areas of health care and health maintenance and thus information on the numbers and characteristics is an important input to health care policy and planning. This paper uses the unique Utah Population Data Base to develop a direct estimate of the number of undocumented in the state in 2009. By combining that information with national demographic measures of the undocumented, it is estimated that there are between 38,696 and 55,603 undocumented immigrants in Utah. This is far less than the widely accepted number of 110,000. Several cross checks with independently developed estimates are carried out in the paper, confirming the validity of the estimates obtained.